The Blizzard
by Ember Nickel
Summary: It was supposed to be a holiday party for the Animorphs and their families. But when intergalactic enemies are having their say, is anything gonna go as planned? Make a wild guess. Set after 8 but before 10.
1. Prologue

Prologue: Toomin (Ellimist)

If I had a body, I would have been smiling. The fool was wasting his time-and his opportunities.

Finally I struck. The meteorology of a remote planet would be altered for a tiny area, for a tiny period of time. A destructive tactic-my opponent would enjoy it.

He noticed, and was not amused. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?

_What does it look like I've done?_

RUINED MY PLANS. DAVID! THE CHEE!

_Generally, ruining your plans is my intention. _

ELLIMIST, DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING?

_Generally, yes. It's a skill of mine._


	2. Nes Gadol Haya Sham

It's Hebrew, it means "a great miracle happened there", and the first letters of the words are written on the sides of the Hannukah dreidel.

That's really all I know about the phrase…but Google is my friend, and I feel the urge to look it up sometime. Now that I actually have time to do something besides killing aliens.

Our family was never really all that…devout. But now more than ever, I feel the urge for something to believe in. Something that doesn't masquerade as a glowing blue man and create all sorts of…Ax? A little help here?

Temporal paradoxes?>

Yeah. Those.

But where to begin? With the snow? With my arrival at my cousins' house? With…Marco. He'd be pleased.


	3. Blue Moon

Author's note: I know how to orient the thoughtspeak signs. does not. Sue them, not me.

"He was just a little kid," Cassie whispered, "and I left him for the Yeerks".

You don't know that they got him. He could have made it out. From his perch on the rafters, Tobias seemed to see things differently, almost coldly. He'd cling to that last chance when most sane people considered themselves doomed.

But I'm not sure I qualify as sane.

My name is Rachel. I have the power to turn into a grizzly bear and rip you to shreds. My best friend, my cousin, and even his goofball friend have this power, and we had been fighting a race of parasitic aliens for months in the company of a blue alien with four eyes and a lethal tail, not to mention the hawk that, okay, I was in love with.

Yeah, I think we need to revisit my qualifications.

>If you had stayed, you would assuredly be a_nothlit_ now.> Ax the Andalite attempted to comfort Cassie. Out of all of us, she's been hurt the most, but shows it the least. Every battle, which is a thrill to me, is infernal for her. Well, it is for all of us, but…ah forget it.

It seemed like it would never end, the war against the Yeerks. It was so draining, and so depressing. But for once in a blue moon, Marco came up with a decent idea. "One week till Christmas," he remarked casually.

"Really?"

He looked angrily at me, rolled his eyes, and then addressed the group at large. "We deserve a break. Why don't we get together for a party?"

"Because you'd try to use it as an excuse to get me to dance with you."

"Rachel, can you go for fifteen minutes without sarcasm?"

I put my hand to my chin. "No. Can you?"

Jake got us back on track, or at least some semblance of a track. "We don't all celebrate Christmas."

"But it would be nice for us to have some kind of thing. It wouldn't have to be related to the holiday." Cassie's voice was quiet and her cheeks were reddening.

"Why don't I ask my parents if we can have it over at my house? They're looking for a chance to get together with your mom anyhow." Jake suggested.

I don't know how he pulled it off, but somehow my mom, Jordan, Sara, and I were piling out of our station wagon at Jake's front door, and there were Cassie and her parents, and Marco and his dad. Even Ax, in his human morph, was there.

It was December twenty-second. I entered the house as the first snowflakes began to fall.


	4. Solstice

Ember notes: I can orient the thoughtspeak signs correctly; FFN cannot.

I sat on the couch, watching life unfold in front of me. For once I could sit back and laugh.

"Jake, who's that?" Sara asked, who was pointing to Cassie, who was eagerly chatting to my parents about her latest environmental endeavor, who were smiling politely.

Jake grinned. "That's my friend Cassie."

Jordan whispered something to Sara and they dashed off, giggling hysterically.

Jake followed them. "Hey, what was that about?"

A beaming Sara informed him. "Well we know Marco's your friend, so that makes Cassie…your _girlfriend!_"

By the time Jake could speak they had already escaped. But five minutes later, Cassie had them engrossed in a game of Parcheesi.

"Hey Rachel," Tom called. "Who's your new friend?"

Huh? Oh. Ax. He took the initiative of answering for himself. "I am a foreign exchange student. Stu-dent."

"He's still learning English," I hastily interjected.

"Oh…okay." Tom nodded critically, his eyebrows narrowed. "Nice to meet you." He extended a hand.

"In our culture, we shake people's hands when we meet them," I tried to be discreet." This, of course, prompted Ax to grab Tom's hand in both of his and vehemently shake it.

"Whoa! Uh, welcome to the U. S.."

I guided Ax across the room, hoping not to arouse Tom's suspicions (rather, the suspicions of the Yeerk in his head) any more. All of a sudden his head twitched. "Excuse me a minute." He clenched his teeth as if thinking hard and then asked, "Is the orbit of the planet malfunctioning?"

Oh boy. Out of all the things that could go wrong, a malfunctioning orbit had not been on my list. "Why do you ask?"

"There's a peculiarity in its motion at the moment."

Tom was coming over. "Ax, quiet down and try to calculate in thoughtspeak instead. Hey Tom, how's it going?" I said.

"Pretty good."

We talked about school, and life. He invited me to join the Sharing, I said that I would consider it. All of a sudden a familiar voice resounded through my brain. >Rachel? Don't try to reply, but it's me. I'm outside. I just wanted to tell you that there's no malfunctioning orbit. Today's the winter solstice, that's what Ax was noticing.>

Ax added to this sheepishly. >I noticed the null derivative, but didn't bother to check for something as menial as a local extremum.>

"No worries," I whispered.

The winter solstice. The longest nights of the year, the most time for stargazing. The time when the days began to lengthen instead of shorten. The time of change.


	5. Gadzooks!

If you're this far into the story, you know how I feel about the orientation of thoughtspeak signs on I hope.

Gadzooks!

Jake's dad came in sweating. Strange for late December, but not so strange considering he was panting under the weight of pizza for fourteen. (There was already pop in the refrigerator.) "Okay, we've got…half sausage half cheese, full pepperoni, and pineapple."

"Really?" Marco asked. "It looks like snow-covered box, snow-covered box, and what have we here? Snow-covered box! Gadzooks!"

"Gadzooks?" Jake shook his head.

"Gadzooks? How is that spelled?" Ax, always seeking to expand his knowledge.

"In-" Marco saw Tom looking at him. "Incredible if I know."

>G-A-D-Z-O-O-K-S>, Tobias informed us.

"Hey, don't take all the cheese!" Sara whined.

We squeezed around the dining room table. I sat between Jordan and Marco's dad. Across from us were Tom and Ax, next to each other. Yeerk and Andalite, side by side.

Ax excused himself to go to the bathroom, where he de- and re-morphed. He returned and sat next to Tom, not betraying the pride he felt in his species and the anger at the Yeerks'.

We finished, and Jake's mom brought out the menorah. His dad led us in the blessings, and Tom placed it in the window.

"How many more rituals are we going through?" Marco's dad asked.

Jake laughed. "You're lucky that you're not at the-"

I can use last names now, can't I?

"…house." Old habits die hard. "By the time they're done, it's Purim!"

"Were we supposed to get that?" Marco asked.

Tom laughed. "Poor minorities, suffering in silence while everyone else is ignorant."

By this time Marco's dad was standing up in anger, and Cassie's mom had gotten riled at the minorities part. There was only one thing that could be done that would be dramatic enough to distract them, and luckily, Jordan was around to do it. The pop we had drunk created a burp so tremendous, I'm still a little shocked Jordan wasn't lifted into orbit.

>The velocity needed for that would not be proportional to Jordan's mass, not even under factorial conditions. Also, she would probably be intercepted by a Bug fighter.>

Thanks, Ax.


	6. Beyond Belief

"I think it's time for us to head out," Cassie's dad said. Her parents had been on edge ever since Tom's "minority" comment.

"Thanks for coming," Jake's parents said. "Great to meet you."

Cassie needed my help to extricate Jordan and Sara from her legs, where they were clinging in anticipation of another Parcheesi game. But at last, they were safely buckled in the car and on their way home.

>The snow's pretty thick out there>, Tobias commented. I hope they'll be okay.

"They'll be fine," I whispered to Jake. He nodded. I knew he care about Cassie's well-being as much as I did, if not more. Although it was hard to imagine her being closer to anyone than me. We'd grown up together, which was one of the reasons it was so hard to imagine her parents on bad terms with my family.

"So how well do you know these kids?" I caught Marco's dad whispering to him.

"Well, Jake's…my best friend…and the others I know through him. So pretty well."

"The foreign exchange student seems a bit…odd."

"He's still adjusting. It's hard on him." Marco was able to get away and slide over to where Ax and I were hanging out.

"Good job dodging the bullet," I said.

"Poor noble Marco, being forced to think in a flash, saved only by his incredible brain…" Marco would say anything to look good, wouldn't he.

"Actually, I believe that his brain exists, so it is not incredible from my perspective." In-credible…wait, we did this in eighth grade English…

…

…

Okay, I've been fighting evil. You can't expect me to remember _everything_.

"You believe that Marco's brain exists? How do you know? Have you, like, crawled into it?"

"Like, what?" A heavy hand weighed down on my shoulder from behind. Tom.

Paralyzed, my teeth chattering, I turned around.

"Aw, Rachel's cold. Sit by me, I'll keep you warm." Marco slid in closer to me. I didn't know whether to thank him for changing the subject, or kill him for…obvious reasons.

"You would be too if you were…um…"

"Subject to a burst of cold air coming from the door?" Ax piped up.

"Burst of cold-" Sure enough, three snow-covered humanoids were emerging.

"The streets are too snowy to drive on," Cassie's mom explained.

"You're welcome to stay here," Jake's dad said. It seemed he was trying to apologize for Tom's behavior.

"We might have to take you up on that," Cassie's dad said.

Marco's dad tried very hard to keep his face even. It would be a long night.


	7. Bluriskio versus Thraukkew

"C'mon, best…uh…" Sara counted on her fingers, deep in thought. "nine out of seventeen?"

Cassie laughed. "I'm getting sleepy. Maybe you and Jordan could play another round."

"Nah, I'm bored. It's too easy when I always win."

"Beginners' luck!" Sara protested.

Marco, Jake, and Tom were in the middle of some video game when Marco's dad interrupted. "Time to skedaddle, kiddo."

"But he's just about to eliminate Jake for me!" Tom complained.

"If you weren't spending all of your time getting powerups you could have won two levels ago," Marco informed him.

"I wouldn't chance those roads," Cassie's dad called.

"We'll be okay," Marco's dad tossed his head.

They exited. Seconds later I heard Tobias's thoughtspeak. >Marco? You can't get home. Not in this weather.>

Ax was the only one that could respond, because human was a morph for him. >His father will not listen to reason.>

"Ax, ask Tobias if we should create a diversion."

>Should we create a diversion?>

>That could be helpful.>

"Oh Mar-co!" I sung.

He jerked his head around. Unfortunately, I had nothing to follow with.

"Uh…what?"

"Your, um, video game. Is it only for three players?"

"Nope. Two to eight."

"Wanna do a two-player?"

"Against you?" I could see the smile curling up his face.

"I'm better than you think."

"Marco, c'mon!" His dad was scraping the windows of the car. "Time to go."

"No, I need to embarrass Rachel."

"Marco, now."

"Don't think so. Besides, it's cold." He followed me back inside.

What could his dad do? Reluctantly, he reentered. I grabbed a control and began pushing stuff.

"So you want to play as Bluriskio? Bad choice, bad choice." Marco carefully selected his character. "I never lose with Thraukkew."

All of a sudden we were on a different screen. Marco's Thraukkew zoomed across while I waddled along, pressing buttons as I went. Marco laughed, enjoying his lead, while I jammed the controls.

"Hey wait a minute, what are you doing with 42 lives?" Marco asked.

"Losing? I don't know."

"You just unlocked a cheat code," said Tom. "Gimme that thing!" He wrenched the control out of my hands.

>Marco is completely engrossed in the game>, Ax informed Tobias.

>Great. And let's just say that if his dad wants to leave again, his car won't be starting for a while.>

"Ask Tobias if he's heading back to the forest," I instructed Ax.

>Rachel wants to know if you're heading back to the forest.>

>Not in this weather. I'm staying where I know where I am.>

"Ask him if he'll be okay."

>Will you be okay?>

>I'm an ex-human, now a hawk, fighting a war against parasitic aliens. I think the definition of "okay" is relative.>

"Tell him that-"

"Rachel, I am not a thoughtspeak broadcaster!"


	8. Differentiate This!

"The snow is not letting up," Ax informed us.

"We see," Marco rolled his eyes.

"Do your parents know where you are?" Jake's mom said worryingly. "There's no way you can get home."

"No, they do not."

"Do you want to call them?"

"Yes!" he exclaimed.

"Uh-oh," Cassie whispered to me. "Of course he wants to call his parents."

"Y'know, their cell phone might not get good reception in this weather," Jake interrupted. "Let's go up to my room and see if they're online, okay? Great." Jake grabbed Ax's arm and almost ran up to his bedroom.

"We're going to have to keep all of you in here, won't we," Jake's dad said. "Let's see…Jake and Marco can go in Tom's room, and maybe this new friend. Then the girls can have Jake's…you two," he indicated Cassie's parents, "can use our bed, we'll fold out the couch, which leaves…" My mom and Marco's dad. "I hate logistics…"

"But logistics are easy. Z is the last letter of the alphabet. Just take the reciprocal of a constant plus an exponentially decaying function." Jake had evidently finished explaining to Ax what was going on.

"Dude, can you do my calculus?" Tom asked.

"Yes, I can, but I'm interpreting your question as a request for assistance, not a survey of my capabilities."

"Just…differentiate something."

"The derivative of the sine function is the cosine function for all real values x."

Tom nodded slowly and backed away dramatically. He backed into Sara, who had crashed on the couch.

"Think it's time to go to bed," my mom smiled.

Cassie, Jordan, a dazed Sara, and I clambered into Jake's room. By the time the adults brought up blankets for us we were already asleep.


	9. In the Night

The noise…

Was it coming from my right? My left? It was too hard to tell in my stupor, and then it stopped. But I couldn't go back to sleep. Not now.

Carefully, trying not to step on Cassie or my sisters, I exited Jake's room and peeked into his parents'. It looked fine. Tom's? Nope. A shadow was moving across the room...an _inhuman_ shadow.

I opened the door. Somebody groaned. (Who slept that close to a door?) Then again, four to a room sucked.

"Is everyone ok?" I whispered.

>I am fine, as are Prince Jake and the others.> Ax was in his Andalite form.

"Doncallmeprinzzzzz…" The noise was not enough to fully waken Jake.

"I'd heard a noise…"

>That would probably have been the alarm clock.> Of course. Ax needed to awake at two-hour intervals.

Ax looked down at Tom, sleeping on his bed. (By process of elimination, Marco had been the one stuck with the sleeping bag by the door.) >How does Prince Jake handle-my tail!>

"If pulling on your tail's what it's going to take, pulling on your tail is what it's going to be."

>What is going to be taken?>

"Don't call me prince."

>I don't understand.>

"Never mind. Anyhow, you'd said my name. Were you talking about me?"

>To some degree. I'm curious as to how you maintain a calm exterior in the midst of…> With his tail blade, Ax pointed to Tom.

"Do I?" Jake sighed.

>You _appear _calm.>

"Well, I'm not."

"None of us are," I told him.

"It's not fair. I want it to be over."

>I believe we all do.>

We stood there in silence, Ax's tail blade a twitch away from killing two, until Jake got back into his sleeping bag. Ax demorphed and climbed into his own. I stayed for a moment longer, then tiptoed into Jake's room, where my sisters and Cassie slept in peace.


	10. 16,777,216

There was a pillow on my face. I pushed it away from me, Sara went tumbling over Jordan, Cassie swiftly exited the room before she got entangled, and it was the start of another day.

Groggily, I made my way to the room where we'd eaten the night before and stared out the window. "It's still so white!"

"No no no, Rachel," Marco said mockingly. "Weren't you paying attention in computer tech? It's closer to color, uh, well, there's like 16 million different colors."

"Your hexadecimal color system? 16,777,216," Ax informed us.

"Most of us just call it white," Jake smiled.

"White…snow…AX!"

"What?" he said innocuously.

"Tobias is out in that snow!"

"Indeed he is."

"How is he? Haven't you gotten in touch with him?"

"I am still not a thoughtspeak broadcaster. Does the word broadcaster have any relationship to castor oil? Oil tastes good…"

"You got that right," Marco said.

"Ax…"

"For my own personal curiosity, and not your demands, I will contact Tobias." Several seconds passed. "He is fine. Cold, but fine."

There was a lot I would have like to have said to Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthil at that moment. Luckily for us all, Cassie was there to restrain me. "Rachel? How about some breakfast?"


	11. Benny Angle and his Greatest Hits

We ate breakfast in shifts; I was with Tom, Cassie, Marco, and his dad. The latter seemed upbeat, considering the weather. "No paper?" he asked, digging into his cereal so it sounded more like "Npapull?"

"No, unless you'd like to dig an igloo and get it," Marco replied.

"That's okay. All the papers ever have is "People blow up"."

Cassie shook her head. "I can't understand why people have to kill each other."

"They don't _have_ to, they just _want_ to," the Yeerk infesting Tom said with my cousin's lips. I wanted to…the adrenaline rush comes just thinking about it.

She reluctantly turned back to her mush, poking at it but not eating.

"Oatmeal, Tom?" Jake's mom asked.

"Nah, I think I'll pass, thanks."

I finished my cereal. "Could I have some more?" I asked.

Jake's dad reached for the box, but Marco leapt up. "Allow me." Melodramatically, he tipped the contents of the box into my bowl. Including the plastic bag. And the bonus CD at the bottom.

"Aw sweet!" Jordan called, running for it. "What's this…Benny Angle's greatest hits?"

"Who's Benny Angle?" asked Cassie.

"He's, like, the most awesome-" Jordan grabbed the CD, and the cereal spilled all over the floor. "uh, singer ever!"

Marco sighed. "Some people just can't ever be appreciated."

"And there's usually a reason for that." I put the plastic bag in the empty box and began scooping up cereal from the floor.

"Rachel, Rachel. Are you ever going to give me the credit I deserve?"

"I _am_ giving it to you. You just don't know what you deserve."

"Hey, lay off him!" Marco's dad commanded.

"I can fight my own battles," I told him.

"Yup, that's our Rachel," Tom laughed. "Gymnast, beauty, and Amazoness warrior."

"What are you talking about?" I almost exploded. He _couldn't_ have known. Could he have? Would I still be alive right now if he did?

"Well, I would have thought five minutes ago that you're one of the last people I would have expected to be violent. But now, based on that, I'm not so sure."

What could I have said? Luckily, Cassie was there to save me. "Hey, gymnastics is competitive."

"Cassie's the gentle one," I said.

Tom nodded. "Gentle. Yeah."

"I wanna eat breakfast now!" Sara whined.

We cleared the table and let her in.


	12. Boardom

"Parcheesi's no fun without Cassie," moaned Jordan as she moved her piece along the gameboard.

"I'm bored," said Sara, knocking over the board.

"You wanna play?" Tom held out the video controller. Marco's eyes were glazed on the screen.

"You kids are spending too much time in front of that box," groaned Marco's dad.

"Yeah, and what about you watching auto racing?" suggested Marco as Thraukkew fended off a virtual fiend.

"That's different."

"Ew, that's gross," said Sara, looking at the pixels of the virtual fiend dissolving. "C'mon Cassie, play with us."

"I'm busy right now," Cassie smiled, and turned back to my mom. "Law firms in Minnesota have reduced emissions considerably by using only sanctioned..."

"You can go ahead and play with the girls, Cassie," my mom smiled weakly.

"Oh,...oh. Guys, do you want to play...I don't know, Tom? Do you have any more...PEACEFUL...video games?

Tom looked at his box. "Hmm...Cavern of Infinite Despair, Disturbingly Disturbing Abyss part II, and...NFL. Nope."

"Wanna build a snowman?" Marco asked, gesturing to the white expanse outside.

"Yes, but I'm not STUPID enough to." Jordan stuck out her tongue. "Jake, will YOU play Parcheesi with us?"

"Nah, I think I'll give it a pass," he replied.

"C'mon, it's boring. I can't go outside, or play with my friends,"

"...and I don't have any projects from school," Sara continued.

Marco dropped his controller. "Wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You're telling me that you LIKE to do projects. From SCHOOL."

"Um, yeah?" she said meekly.

He threw up his hands. "Okay. This really is the end of the world."

"As if this blizzard wasn't enough," his dad said. 


	13. Parcheesi Immunity

"Rachel," Marco said, "we need to do something. If only to keep your sisters occupied." 

"Such as...what?"

"I dunno, like a scavenger hunt?"

"Sure. Have you ever done one before?"

"No. Have you?"

"No."

"This could be a problem. Jake? Cassie?" They scurried over. "Have either of you ever made a scavenger hunt?"

"No," they replied in unison.

"Scavenger hunt?" Jordan asked. "I'm good at those. I did one in third grade. Do you guys need me to make one?"

We didn't have anything to say for a moment until Jake spoke, "Yeah, that would be great! Do you want to work with Sara?"

"Nah..." Jordan whispered conspiratorially. "she's too dumb!"

"Well, you go ahead and get started," said Cassie. Jordan needed no further encouragement; she headed up the stairs. Sara trooped after her.

"Should be interesting," Marco nodded at Sara.

"Thanks anyhow," Jake said. "If those two asked me when I was going...to...do something...one more time, I'd-"

"Do what?" Cassie asked innocently.

Jake's face turned an awkward shade-hey Ax, were you there for that?

>No, I wasn't, I was->

Oh, right, of course you weren't.

>Why do you ask?>

I was wondering if you could tell me which of the web colors it was.

>No.>

I'll have to be descriptive then (ha, I _did_ learn something from middle school English!). Jake's face turned an a shade of red that looked like a sickly baby Taxxon. "To...uh...go out with you."

Cassie smiled. "I guess I've got Parcheesi immunity."

I'm guessing Marco was about to say something, but he didn't get the chance. Sara fled down the stairs, traumatized and sobbing. She flung herself onto Mom's lap, muffling her cries. Mom ran her hand over Sara's hair until her whimpers faded. "Are you okay, honey?"

"I saw s-something scary."

"Can you tell me about it?"

"I w-was in the hallway. Looking f-for something to help Jordan with h-her treasure hunt. And I t-tried to open the door to the bathr-room, and I saw a blue m-monster. It had f-four-"

Tom jumped out of his chair, jaw tight.


	14. Anticlimax

"Tom?" Jake's dad asked. 

I couldn't speak. Couldn't move. Couldn't think.

"This is enough!" he exclaimed. "Sara, I'm sorry that you saw the monster. You guys-" he looked at us pleadingly, "she doesn't deserve this! None of us deserve it! Are we going insane?"

"I really hope not. We've only been here for less than a day," Marco said. I waited for Ax to tell us the exact figure, but then realized he was still, naturally, in the bathroom. A small relief.

"This is it." Tom strode across the room and grasped the doorknob.

"Whoa...take it easy, dude." Marco (5 foot 3) tried to place a warning hand on the shoulder of Tom (5 foot 10). "You can't go out in that weather."

"Yeah, I can."

"Nope. Not a smart move."

"Marco, that's my cousin over there. The one who just saw a blue monster with four eyes-"

Jake looked at me in puzzlement. I nodded. Tom's Yeerk had just made a fatal flaw. Cassie caught it, as well, and spoke. "Four eyes?"

Sara nodded, her face still pressed in Mom's wrinkled clothes.

"But Tom...Sara didn't say that."

"She-was about to. I could hear the pre-sound."

"Presound?" my mom asked dubiously.

"Yeah, we did it in the acoustics lab last semester."

"The acoustics lab."

"Yeah! Anyhow, I'm sorry, but I've got to get out of here."

It would have been so easy not to interfere. Let him walk out and freeze to death. But of course, we didn't.

"Why don't you go up to the bathroom yourself, Tom?" Jake suggested. "See if there's a big blue four-eyed monster or just a shower curtain?"

Tom nodded shrewdly. "Yeah. Yeah, I think I'll do that." He darted up the stairs.

Marco crossed back over to Jake. "Nice going. You just invited him right upstairs, where he can use his own private phone."

"Oh-" Jake was gone before the next word could get out of his mouth. Up the stairs he went, yards, feet, now inches behind Tom. The latter, hearing him was wise enough to open the bathroom, to prevent suspicion.

Ax stepped out. "Hello?"

"What are you?" Tom asked, his face as cold and emotionless as a black hole.

"He's an exchange student!" Jake replied indignantly.

"I don't think so..._Andalite_," Tom hissed.

"Andalite?" Jake asked. "What?"

"Hate to break it to you, but your friend's an alien."

Jake shook his head. "What the...what the heck are you talking about?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"I am utterly confused," Ax deadpanned.

"Oh...oh...ooooh. Oh hold on. I think I know what's going on. Really sorry." And as fast as he had come up, Tom descended. "Sara?" he said gently. "Sara, can you talk to me sometime?"

"Not now."

"Oh, okay. Maybe...maybe later, okay?"

"Okay."

Jake and Ax, unsure whether to be totally petrified or not, followed. Tom looked genuinely crestfallen. "I'm sorry, guys...this is something else, between Sara and me. Totally doesn't involve you, and you," he nodded at Ax, "aren't an alien. I must have lost my marbles."

Jordan poked her face down from the top of the stairs. "Well are you ready to find mine?"


	15. Costs of Playing

"Find yours?" Cassie asked.

"My marbles! It's the treasure hunt," Jordan informed, hands on hips, as if exasperated by our stupidity. "Are you guys ready?"

"Yeah!" I said. "Do we get any hints?"

"Mm-hmm." She handed me a folded slip of paper.

_If up the stairs you climb  
__You may find where I'm  
__Hiding the treasure. Look  
__In a 128 page book._

"How do you get marbles in a book?" Marco asked from behind me. Too close behind me.

"Bubble, Marco. This is Rachel's own personal space."

"Maybe the next clue is in the book?" Jake suggested.

Jordan giggled. "Not telling!"

"Guess we're on our own, then," Cassie said. She made for the stairs, then turned back. "Sara? Are you gonna be okay?"

She nodded, silently.

"D'ya wanna help us with the treasure hunt?"

"No thank you," she said politely through her missing teeth.

"Okay then." Cassie led the way up the stairs.

"Jake, do you even _have_ any books?" asked Marco.

He did not reply.

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"Well do you have any books?"

"Well should you care?"

"Well, Jordan's thing tells us to look in a 128 page book. Upstairs."

"Nah, I go for big tough books. 128's too wimpy for me."

Marco rolled his eyes. "Tom's room, then?"

"Sure," I said, pushing it open. "Although he's not the most literary either."

True to form, there was no semblance of a book in the visible areas of the room. Although between the clothes and CDs, there wasn't much visible area of the room.

"In the closet?" Jake suggested.

Marco opened it up. "Nope, no books. But we do have-" Marco tensed up and slammed the door shut. "No book. Moving on."

"What was in there?" Cassie asked.

"None of our business."

"C'mon," I pressed him.

"No." I lunged for the door, but I couldn't get past him. "Rachel…nope. We're looking for a book, right?"

"Right. 128 pages. Under the bed, maybe?"

Cassie poked her head underneath. "Errgh! This reeks of…testosterone!"

"Let me in," Jake said. "I can handle it." Sure enough, he submerged himself in the netherworld. "Oh yeah, there's a book here-oof! How did Jordan get here?"

"By being significantly smaller than us," Marco told him.

"Us? Not significantly." Jake emerged with a glossy manual: _Quixotic Quest of Quirks_.

"Hey, I take that as a personal insult."

"To some degree, that's how it was meant. Ten bucks says Tom never read the strategy manual." He passed it to me.

I opened it up. "You lose. He's highlighted something: _While the benefits of playing as Thraukkew are evident, experienced players can find ways to stymie it._

Marco knelt down, head in hands. "I'm doomed."

I riffled through the book. "128 pages, all right. And here we have it!" A slip of paper fell out.

Cassie delicately picked it up.

_Now downstairs you must go  
__And even more below.  
__I am certain  
__You want to find the curtain._

"Even more below? Did Jordan go into the _basement_?" Jake queried.

"Is there something wrong with that?" asked Cassie.

"Only that nobody's been there in the last…decade."

Marco shrugged. "We're trendsetters. Where's the basement, Jake?"

He led us downstairs, and through a mudroom. "Right down there." Cassie charged in. "Be careful, it's-"

There was a crack, an abrupt inhalation of breath, and then a desperate sound of scratching.


	16. Exhibit A

Jake grabbed Cassie's hands, which were clinging to the edge of the stair. "Maybe a little less enthusiasm next time?"

She clambered up. "Y-yeah."

We descended the stairs. Surprisingly, Marco did not comment. Until we reached the bottom. While the three of us looked around for a curtain, Marco turned to inspect the stairs and nodded. "Yup. As I suspected."

"Do I want to know?" Jake asked.

"No. You don't. But you're going to. Cassie, come over here." Reluctantly, she came. "Good. Now, stand next to the staircase, right? Okay, and stretch your arms up."

"Nope, this is not going to be pleasant."

"You're right. Now are you going to stretch them up, or will I have to hoist them?"

At that, they shot up so fast that I'm amazed (and mildly disappointed) that Marco wasn't hit by them.

>Why would that be a disappointment?>

Ax…not now.

>Not what now?>

Not going to explain now.

"Okay everyone. Note-exhibit A. Cassie, how far would you estimate your fingertips are below the stair?"

"Uh…six inches?"

"Good guess! Jake, when you so gallantly dashed in there to save Cassie, you stopped her from a traumatic _six-inch_ fall. This has been a public service announcement courtesy of Marco-"

"Is that the curtain?" Jake interjected.

"I don't know, is it?"

"Yeah, I think so." He indicated a shower curtain with a gaudy floral pattern.

"Ook…_somebody_ needs a sense of fashion," I commented. "I'll just divert my eyes until you guys find the next clue."

"Right here," said Cassie.

_You are far from the marbles, but will get hot  
__If you go somewhere that is not  
__And walk three steps to the right.  
__That will make your future bright._

"Someplace that is not…what?" I asked.

"Hot."

"Well, that includes any building that Marco's in. Not much help there."

Jake insisted on taking it somewhat more seriously. "Or, considering that we are in the middle of a blizzard, the entire place is bound to be relatively cold anyhow."

"But Jordan wouldn't be thinking that way, I don't think," Cassie said. "What would _she_ consider not hot?"

"Cold…ice…water…" I automatically replied.

"Ice, that's right, the freezer," said Jake. "So is the next clue in there?"

"Three steps to the right," Cassie reminded him.

"Let's go! And…Cassie?"

"Yeah?"

"Watch your step."

She nodded. "Thanks."

We made it into the kitchen. "You guys getting hungry?" asked Jake's dad.

"_Getting_?" Marco's jaw dropped.

Cassie looked at the clock. "It's almost noon already!"

"I'm heating up the leftover pizza, but there won't be enough for everyone to have a full meal, so check the cupboard to see what else I can get you," Jake's dad invited. Marco took him up immediately on that offer.

Jake, however, was focused on the hunt. He walked over to the freezer. "Three steps to the right…"

For the second time in half an hour, relative size came into play. Jordan's 4 feet 7. Jake's 5 feet 4. Yeah, there's gonna be a bit of a difference there.

He took three steps, the third of which was onto his dad's foot. The cookie sheet the pizza was on went flying, and Jake's dad, startled, stepped back. Jake's momentum carried him into the oven. I pulled him out as Marco caught the pan on the fly. Unfortunately, he caught it upside-down, leaving the pizza on the floor.

The oven had presumably been on pre-heat, but Jake felt fine and waved off complaints. Cassie might have made a fuss if she hadn't found the clue.

_You're almost done  
__I hope you had fun  
__But now you have to go  
__To where you begun._

"Tsk tsk," Marco rolled his eyes. "It's bad form to change your rhyme…uh…scheme? Is that the word? in the middle of a scavenger hunt."

"I don't think it's the middle, I think it's the end," Jake retorted. "Are the marbles under Tom's bed?"

We clambered up the stairs and poked-okay, Jake and Marco poked, Cassie and I kept a safe distance-underneath, but weren't successful.

"They should be here," I argued, "this is where we began."

"Begun," Marco tried to correct me.

"Began."

"She wrote begun."

"She's wrong."

"If you guys would shut up, Cassie has something to say," Jake chastised us.

"Yes _sir_," Marco saluted.

Jake took a deep breath while Cassie talked. "We didn't _start_ up here. We started down in the living room."

"But we were in there the whole time," I reminded her. "She couldn't have hidden them."

"We were distracted," Jake remembered, "with Tom and Sara. She might have been able to."

"Worth a shot," Marco vacated the room and headed for the stairs.


	17. Mezzologue: Ax

Mezzologue: Ax

Up and down the stairs they went. I could not discern the function of their hunt, but kept occupied. Tom was attempting to talk to Sara, but not very successfully. So he turned his focus to me instead. "Listen, dude, I'm really sorry about that whole alien thing."

"I accept your apology. Gee."

"Yeah, it's cool, right? 'Cause you…_are_…a human. Aren't you?"

"I am a human." At that moment I was, so it was not a lie.

"Are you a gamer?" I probably looked very startled, although I could not see what my face looked like. "Er, do you like to play video games?"

"Yes. I do."

"Would you like to play one with me?"

"I will. I would prefer the game you were playing with Marco and Jake."

"Sure, sure." Tom pushed buttons on the antiquated machine and handed me a game controller. It was simplistic to figure out how it worked. I was prompted to choose a persona that I would maneuver through a series of levels. I selected Stalozux and began my navigation.

"What is the purpose of this game?"

"To beat me."

"How are you beaten?"

"By falling into traps or running out of hitpoints. Or time."

"Hitpoints?"

Tom indicated a numerical display in the corner of the screen. I was attentive to it-so attentive that Stalozux tumbled from a pixilated ledge to its virtual nonexistence. "Whoa, my bad." He pressed a few buttons, restarting the game. "Try now."

I led Stalozux down to a silver door, where I was faced with simplistic questions that were supposed to be mentally stressful for human players. Correctly answering them enabled me to access a "Spaceship Powerup", which enabled Stalozux to move at high speeds and in the air. The spaceship, however, had no capability to erode the hitpoints of Tom's avatar.

"You made it through the Mental Maze of Mathematical Mirages?" he gaped.

I tried to come up with an answer that would not give away my identity. "Much of it was guessing." It hurt me to lie, but not as much as I knew it would from telling the truth.

He was still wary, and tried to probe me further. "Why'd you choose Stalozux?"

"Why should I not have?"

"I dunno. Just curious…How old are you?"

"Thir…teen," I said, knowing I should have gone with a higher number.

He dropped his controller. "You're in calculus?"

_Actually, I mastered that at the age you'd call "eight"._ "I'm prodigious."

"No duh. And awfully…" He pushed a button and paused the game, going over to talk to Sara again.

>Mastered what?> Evidently I had been in thoughtspeak, and Tobias was replying.

>Integral and differential calculus.>

>Wow.>

>Not really. Most of my classmates could do it when they were your equivalent of seven.>

>Oh.>

Tom returned from talking with Sara, making an angry face. He forcefully jabbed some buttons and restarted the game. "No more math tricks. This is a straight-out race. Hand-eye coordination. Human hands, right?"

I nodded, unsure.

"Good. This one is for all the marbles."

At that instant Marco ran down the stairs, with Rachel, Jake, and Cassie behind. They knelt behind the machine we were using and produced a box that read _Quixotic Quest of Quirks_. Marco pulled it open, and marbles fell out of it and onto the floor. I was as surprised, as was Tom. "So it is."


	18. The end of the world as we know it

Jordan looked mildly crushed that we'd solved it so fast, but was proud of us as well. "Good job! Can we eat lunch now?"

Jake's dad smiled. "We can try. We don't have any more pizza."

"Aww…" moaned Sara. "Can you make french toast?

"French toast! French toast!" Jordan began to jump up and down.

Jake's dad pretended to be overwhelmed. "The people have spoken! I'll see what I can do." He headed into the kitchen.

Tom was inspecting the marbles. "Pretty neat collection you've got."

"Thanks," Jordan smiled. "Cassie?"

"Mmhmm?" she replied distractedly.

"Do you, like, _like_ like Jake?"

"Like, no-oh!" Marco's dad replied in a fake girly-voice. "Like, he's too, like, cool, for like, fatsos, like me!"

Cassie (who is _not_ overweight) was too traumatized to speak, but Marco wasn't. "Rachel here takes offense at that. She's cute, yet she's, like-oh, here we go again."

"Who gains pleasure from-um-um-um such conversay-ay-tions?" Ax inquired.

"Nobody does. We're just passing the time while we go through the Apocalypse," Marco's dad said.

"What is the Apocalypse?"

I covered my head in my hands. Not the right question, not the right company.

Cassie's dad immediately interjected. "It's an interpretation of a hallucination."

"Just like the Pledge of Allegiance is a mindless rote recitation? Huh?"

Marco was counting on his fingers. "Reh-cit-ay-that's a ten-letter word. I didn't think my dad knew those."

"You stay out of this."

"What? Can't I share my opinion and participate in, a, um,"

"Free forum and interchange of beliefs?" suggested Cassie's mom.

"Yeah, one of those."

My mom kind of narrowed her eyes. "Um, no, I don't think so. Is lunch ready?"

"Not quite," Jake's dad called from the kitchen.

"Let's try this again," bossed Jordan. "Jake, do you, um, like Cassie?"

"Why do you want to know?" he deflected.

This stymied her.


	19. Precision and Fury

Again, we had to eat in shifts. I was waiting my turn when I heard Ax's voice in thoughtspeak. >Rachel? Could you please interrupt Cassie's mother?>

I listened. She was having a one-sided conversation with Ax. "…are equally viable to interpret…"

>I'm not sure how to do so politely.>

"…rather than the stated figure of one hundred fort…"

"Hey, um, would either of you like some lunch?" I helped Ax out.

"Thank you, yes, I think I'll have some. Have you eaten?"

"Not yet. I'm still full from breakfast."

She narrowed her eyes shrewdly, as Ax scurried off of the scene. "Are you sure?"

I laughed. "Yeah. Pretty darn sure."

Now she seemed concerned. "I still think you should eat."

"I will."

She headed off into the kitchen, shaking her head almost imperceptibly. Cassie emerged from it shortly after, her hair tangled in a knot that made Rubik's Cube look easy.

"Let me fix that," I interjected.

She was baffled. "Fix what?"

"Your _hair_."

"Is there something wrong with it?"

"Something-good grief." I knelt down behind her and began sorting through the labyrinth. It felt so good to be able to do something with her again that did not involve Yeerks. To have even a semblance of a normal life. There were only two problems. The first was the state. "Cassie?"

"Mm-mm?"

"Have you washed this in the last…year?"

She pretended to count on her fingers (I hope, I hope). "Yeah, um…yup. I have."

I took a deep breath and was about to reply when her mom showed up. "Hello, Rachel?"

"Hey there! How's it going?"

"Why haven't you eaten yet?"

I looked at the clock. Seeing how much time had passed took on even more meaning since I learned the consequences of the morph limit. "I lost track of time."

"There's plenty of food."

"Okay, great." Now that she brought it up, I realized how hungry I felt! There were a few slices of French toast left, which I attacked with the precision and fury I'd used in my grizzly morph so many times. Then I returned to my project. "Errgh! Are there any fine combs in here?"

"What do you think?" asked Tom. "Not to offend, but many of us don't care."

I couldn't respond, and Cassie took advantage of my pause to escape. Jordan then suggested that she do my hair, which I accepted. Unfortunately, this wound up with me being tied to the couch. I was in an even more precarious position when I realized who was all available to extricate me. There was nobody I'd consider competent, or at my level. So I stayed where I was.

It actually wasn't that bad-nobody was doing anything more engaging. Cassie offered to untie me but I politely declined. She then tried to find an excuse to avoid another interminable Parcheesi game, but the only available option was playing _Disturbingly Disturbing Abyss, Part II,_ against Jake. Marco wanted to do the "color commentary" for that, but gave up when he realized it spoiled _Disturbingly Disturbing Abyss_ (presumably the original, not yet entitled Part I), which he hadn't beaten yet. So Sara decided tocommentate instead.


	20. Andromeda

"Okay," Sara said. "This looks interesting. There is a big white line down the middle of the screen."

"That's not big," Marco said from the futon. "Big is megabytes. Big is not dividers."

"I thought you weren't gonna announce."

"Oh yeah. Sorry."

"Okay, so now Jake is pushing buttons and so is Cassie. Cassie's side of the screen says Game Over and Jake's says You Win."

Cassie looked at the screen. "Ah, so it does."

"Rematch?" offered Jake.

"No…no, I think I'll pass."

"Great!" said Tom, whipping out the NFL game. "What team?"

Cassie stared in utter bewilderment. "Um…Jordan? D'you want to play Parcheesi?"

"Sure!" Jordan exclaimed.

Sara hovered over them. "Now Cassie is rolling the dice. And moving her pieces."

"No," Ax contradicted.

"No? Whaddaya mean no?"

"She is only moving one piece. Pieccca-pizza! Not pieces, plural."

"Oookay. Now Jordan is moving."

Sara continued with this for some time until Marco intervened. "Hey, Sara, you want another game to announce?"

"Oh sure, what?"

He whispered something in her ear, something that caused her to narrow her eyes critically and whisper something back. He puzzled a moment before replying. She rolled her eyes but agreed. "Okay. I am Sara-"

It feels _so_ good to be able to use last names now. What?

>I am feeling guilty for being able to use my full name in the narratives when you and the others could not.>

Ax, it's fine.

"-on an announcing mission. I will be following the progress of Super-Marco as he attempts another-what did you say?"

"Dangerous deed."

_Preferably one that does _not _involve morphing,_ I thought. Luckily, it didn't.

Unluckily...

Marco stalked over across the room. "Now he's taking one step. Now another. Now another. Now another. Now he's stopped." Thank goodness. "Now he is creeping behind the couch..." Tom, who I think had figured out what was going on, eagerly shoved it out of his way.

I was annoyed. "Hey, watch it, that's my hair!"

"Your hair?" Tom gasped in mock astonishment. "Tied to the couch? That cannot be! Sara, what are we gonna do?"

"I don't know," she replied innocently.

Something was pulling my hair. "Hey!"

Marco emerged proudly. "Successful again." He held something golden between his thumb and first finger.

Expecting the worst, I dashed off into the bathroom. Only one mirror, so I couldn't get a decent view of the back of my head. But it was less monstrous than I would have expected. Reluctantly, I returned to the living room.

Jake's dad had come up from a back room. He was holding something close to him that he didn't want us to see as he entered the kitchen. All of a sudden I heard a musical chord. "Dinner bell!" he called.

"What was that?" Jake's mom asked.

"Uggle-grr."

Tom's look was one of true horror. "You-found-that-bear?" He fought for control of his voice.

"Oh yes, it's got a lovely bell-sound. Should I set it its own place at the table like we had to do years ago?"

Tom's face was still frozen in its macabre mask.

"I'll take that as a no."


	21. Troubadours

"Who's eating first?" Jake's dad asked.

"I would very much like to eat. Tweet is a bird sound. Did you make spaghetti? Ti?" Guess who.

>Wasn't that me?>

Yeah, Ax.

"Yeah, I did make spaghetti. Okay, would you three like to go ahead?" He indicated Cassie and her parents. I really hoped he wasn't still trying to make up for Tom's humor.

"I don't think that would be a good idea." Cassie's mom elbowed her husband. "Otherwise nobody else would have anything to eat."

While they argued, I lay down on the couch and mindlessly ran my fingers through my hair, trying to get over the trauma of having Marco extricate me. And realized I hadn't washed my hair that morning. "Jake? Tom?"

The latter was still disturbed from the resurrection of Uggle-grr, so Jake responded. "Yeah?"

"What kind of shampoo do you guys have here?"

"Uh, just…the normal kind?"

"The normal kind? Whaddaya mean the normal kind?"

He wrinkled his eyebrows. "How many kinds are there?"

Cassie smiled. "Jake, welcome to my life."

"Aw…it's bearable."

"Emphasis on "bear"?" Cassie winked at Tom, who clenched his eyes closed even tighter. No-his Yeerk. Did it help me any to remember that?

>I don't know.>

That was a rhetorical question.

While I looked up at the ceiling, full of angst over my condition, time passed. Once again I was last to eat. "Aren't you going to have anything?" Cassie's mom, who else?

"I'm not hungry. Jordan or Sara can have my noodles."

She looked reprovingly at me. "There's enough for all of us. You don't have to play that game."

"What…game?"

"That being-all-noble game."

"I'm. Not. Hungry."

A voice sang from behind me. "Can't carry the world alone. But through the years it has been shown-"

Cassie's mom laughed at her husband. "Try singing _with_ the guitar next time."

He shrugged. "They don't have one. I had to improvise…or do you?"

"We did, for a while around my twelfth birthday," Tom reminisced. "Electric. It broke within the week."

"Neh. All the good folk songs need guitar."

"What-ut is a folk song?" wondered Ax.

"It's…um…a song that gets passed down over time," Cassie's mom told him.

"And a guitar is a musical instrument," I cut in before he could ask again.

Oh. He only communicated with me. Well, she is incorrect. My people have passed down many songs without the use of guitars.

I waved him out of the room. "Hey, where are you two going?" Cassie's mom stood up.

"Just to talk," I shrugged.

She sat back down dubiously. Marco tried to keep from laughing.

We climbed the stairs to Jake's room. >As long as I'm here, I'll demorph.> Ax closed the windows and did so. >What do you want?>

"I wanted to ask about your song. Could you sing it for us?"

>I would err with a human mouth.>

"Please?"

>I can thoughtspeak it to you and the others.>

"Okay, cool." I ran back down and rounded them up. "Okay, Ax, go ahead."

He closed his stalk eyes in concentration. All of a sudden I saw an image of a…thing. A really small thing. And it was happy. How did I know that? The poem was addressed to the insect-it was an insect? Yeah…

We were all held captivated until Ax finished. "Whoa…" I breathed.

"The bug…I couldn't get its name…" Cassie concentrated.

"It knows something you don't know? Is that it?" Jake pushed.

"Its place. It knows its place."

Marco wrinkled his eyebrows. "And you're jealous because you don't."

>I'm rather amazed you were able to gather that. I never thought myself capable of sending such complex messages.>

>What the _heck_ just happened in there?>

"Tobias!" I exclaimed as Marco rolled his eyes.

>I was demonstrating a "folk song".>

>In Andalitian? Er, what do you call your language?>

>Thoughtspeak. There hasn't been a language comparable to yours for a significant period of time.>

>Well, I heard something. Does _dirrabepe shnaol_ mean anything to you?>

>Yes, of course, that's the sound of the _hoober_.>

>Well…I don't know what to say.>

And neither did we. I ate my dinner and we tried to watch TV, but the cable was out. As I climbed into the sleeping bag in Jake's room, I thought about that song. Where was my place?

Where were any of ours?


	22. A Step Back from Differentiation

_Author's Note: In case you haven't noticed, "Songs of the Species" is up. This contains not only the full text of "Dirrabepe Shnaol" but Benny Angle's greatest hit. A _Jubba-Jubba _paraphrase is forthcoming._

"Ra-chel!" Jordan sang.

Blearily, I looked at the clock. "Okay, Jordan? We're going to do some math here."

"I don't like math!" She sprinted out of the bedroom.

"I like math," Sara whispered shyly.

"Okay." I rolled my eyes, or I would have if they had been open. "Sara, see the numbers on the clock? How many are there?"

"Three."

"Good job. Now, when you see _three_ numbers that means it's time for Rachel to be asleep. When you see _four_ numbers that means Rachel can wake up." I rolled over. A few minutes passed without me being able to go back to sleep. Realizing what might be going on, I turned back. "Sara?"

"Yeah?"

"You don't have to _stay_ staring at the clock." Only when I'd fulfilled my duties as a big sister was I able to get back to sleep. I didn't even want to know what that said about me.

I was going to get into the kitchen and eat breakfast/lunch before Cassie's mom forced me to. However, it was empty. I assumed that I was just late. "Any cereal?" I hollered.

Jake's dad came up to me. "We're saving it for later tonight."

"We're gonna have a party!" Sara exclaimed.

I raised my eyebrows a little. "Oh. Cool."

"Yeah…" Jake's dad nodded towards the hallway. I followed him into his bedroom, where he closed the door. "We don't have much left, and we don't know how long we'll be in here. So we've-the other adults and I-'ve decided not to overdose, cut down on our meals. Y'know?"

"Yeah. Are Jordan and Sara the only ones in the dark?"

"Presumably. I implied to Jake that he could tell your friends, so I'm assuming they know." Sure it would go over well with Ax.

"Okay. Well, thanks."

I headed out of the room, only to be accosted by Jake. "Rachel? We've got a bit of a situation on our hands."

"How big a bit?"

"Eh, pretty big. C'mon."

Jake's mom was leaning against the door, arms folded. "What can be so important that you have to go out in this weather?"

"Mom, it can't be that bad," Tom answered. "Not after two nights."

"Oh, I think it can."

"What do we do?" I whispered to Jake. He waved the others over.

"What do we do?" Marco asked.

Jake rolled his eyes. "I don't think Tom can win against my parents, so all we have to do is make sure he stays in the house."

>How long has it been since his last visit to the Yeerk Pool?> Ax privately asked us.

"Erm, you know…I _don't_ know. But I think before the party, uh, two days ago?"

>How long before?>

"I don't know. I can't do that freaky clock thing."

>What freaky clock thing?>

"Ax…let's just take it easy, okay?" We "broke huddle". "Dude, have you looked out the window?"

Tom turned to face Jake. "Yeah, actually, I have."

"There's no way you can go out in that."

"Yeah…there is."

"No," Jake's dad declared authoritatively.

"Fine. Fine. I'm going up to my room." He took off up the stairs, almost casually. Marco nodded to Jake and followed him, returning a few minutes later.

"Well?" Jake hissed.

"Just brooding."

"Good thing we don't still have that electric guitar."

"Yeah, I guess. There's enough angst here already."

>Rachel?>

What?

>What was that "freaky clock thing" Jake spoke of?>

Your, um, skill.

>My skill?>

Yeah. Um…yeah. That.


	23. Math of All Levels

It was hard to resist the temptation not to go up the stairs and peek at whatever Tom was doing. Jake and Marco reassured us he was fine, and we didn't want to attract attention, but boy did that get aggravating after a while.

I was pacing automatically on one strip of the carpet, head down, when I ran (more accurately: shuffled) into Marco, going perpendicular to me. "Hey, watch it," he muttered.

"What, you've got a claim on that square foot?"

"Yes, Rachel, I have a claim on this square foot." He turned around and started going the other way.

For a brief minute I was pushed to action. I cut diagonally across the room, picked up one of the (video game) controllers, and waved it in Marco's direction. "Don't you want to play?"

"No."

And all shred of energy left me. I restarted pacing, taking care to go perpendicular to Marco this time.

>Rachel, you were going perpendicular previous to that.>

Parallel then. I wasn't so hot in math either.

I restarted pacing, taking care to go _parallel_ to Marco. It wasn't long before I caught Cassie doing the same thing out of the corner of my eye. Jake was trying to resist, but I could see his fingers tap mindlessly against the couch. Ax was staring into space.

I sat down next to him and whispered, "How long have you been in morph?"

>squared over two…plus C…>

"Ax, not math. Okay? Not now. How long have you been in morph?"

>>That _was_ math.

You're right, okay, it was. But none of us were really all together that day.

>I think we _were_ all together. And had been for the past day.>

Ax…

>Yes?>

Never mind.

>Approximately two hours,> he droned.

"Ax!" Have you ever screamed and whispered at the same time?

>No.>

Ax, that was a ret-ritt-not meant to be answered.

>Then why did you ask it?>

Be…cause. Okay. Have you ever screamed and whispered at the same time, and Ax, don't answer this. ? That's what I was doing. "Ax!" I hissed. "You gotta demorph!"

>I what?>

This was bad. This was seriously bad. I stood up. "Jake?"

He spasmed. "Wh-what?"

"Jake. Hello. Earth to you." I knelt down on the floor. "Ax needs to demorph. Talk some sense into him."

He looked at me blankly.

"Ax. Our friend."

Oh man, this sucked. We were going insane. I grabbed Cassie's hand, knocking her off-balance and throwing her to the floor. "Cassie. I need your help. Now."

She jerked her head side to side for a moment, as if brushing off the shroud of lethargy that lay over us. "With what?"

I pulled her down to whispering level. "Ax. He needs to demorph."

She looked at the clock. "Oh…" Then walked over and nudged Ax lightly. "Hey, you have a minute? C'mon. I've got some, er, Cinnabuns."

If that wouldn't wake him from his stupor, nothing would.

>…as x goes to infinity…>

"Bun-zuh?" she added half-heartedly.


	24. Angst and Luck

Cassie turned to me and shrugged helplessly.

"What?" I snapped. "Do something!"

"Hookay," she turned away from me and reached for Ax's shoulder. "Come on, big guy. Up and at'em."

Jake reached out. Together, they supported him out of the room.

"Is he okay?" Sara looked up at me with innocent eyes.

"I think so. He's just not happy."

"If I was unhappy, would you drag me up off the couch?"

I smiled at her. "You're not _on_ the couch."

"What if I _was_ on the couch?"

"Maybe. It would depend."

"On what?"

"A lot of things."

"How many?"

"A lot."

"A billion?"

"I don't know."

"A googol?" Jordan excitedly yelled in such a voice that it jolted Marco's dad out of the stupor he seemed to be in.

"Hey, cut it out! I'm trying to…" Unable to decide what he was in fact trying to do, he trailed off.

"A googol's the biggest number there is. Except infinity," Jordan declared authoritatively.

"Do you mean aleph-null? Null-uh?"

My head flashed towards the hallway. Cassie nodded at me, a nod saying _Yes, we pulled it off._.

"I don't know…do I?" Jordan asked.

"I don't know! I don't know all your big words! Or all of the ones Tom says at me!" Sara lost it. Our mom awkwardly reached for her and tried to take her hand, but she retracted.

Marco spoke warily. "Where…is Tom?"

"Still up in his room, I guess." Jake's dad rolled his eyes.

"What kind of big words has he been saying at you?"

"I don't _know!_ If I _knew_ they'd make _sense_!" Sara stuck out her jaw.

"Oh…kay then." Marco shook his head, as if trying to shake something off.

Jordan approached Cassie's dad. "What was that song you were singing?"

"What song?"

"The one you were singing last night. I thought maybe if you sang it again it would cheer Sara up?"

"It…didn't really cheer _me_ up," I nudged Jordan.

"Well fine. One good idea I come up with…"

"No! I…didn't mean it _that_ way, I…"

"Just shut up. You don't understand." She went _down_ to the basement.

"Oh-" My mom ran after her. "Jor-dan!"

"Are we going to run out of water or floors for angsty kids to brood in first?" Marco's dad said in a monotone.

"Based on the current-tuh-tuh- ratios, I think-" Do I really need to identify who that was?

>No.>

"Shut. UP!" Marco's dad turned and faced Ax.

"Are we counting angsty adults on that list?" Marco asked.

Marco's dad seemed to deliberate over who he was going to kill first, but wound up sitting back down listlessly.

"Am I seeing what I think I'm seeing?"

"What do you think you're seeing?" smiled Cassie's mom. Out of all of us, she seemed the most sane. Or at least normal. Then again, many of us were automatically excluded.

"I'll be quiet and not press my luck further."

"Your luck?" I wasn't sure whether Jake's dad was kidding around actually incredulous. "You feel lucky?"

"Today-ay," No, it wasn't Ax who said that! "I consider myself the luckiest man…on the face of the Earth." Jake was beaming brighter than I'd seen him for the past few days, almost collapsing with laughter at what I thought was his own joke. I had no idea what he were talking about.

"Are you kidding me?" Marco turned to face him, mouth open. "You memorized that? Even down to his tone of voice?"

"Aw, Tom's got the whole speech down. It's insane."

"_You're_ insane."

"Thank you, Marco." Jake touched his heart and nodded gravely. "I feel that right here."

"You're welcome," Marco said with the same mock seriousness. "Anything I can do."

"Can you devise a way to get us out of here?"

"Hmm…let me think." Marco put a hand on his chin. "We could…send the Earth towards the sun, thus melting the snow, thus letting us out."

"And…how do we get the Earth towards the sun?"

"We…um…change its orbit."

"By application-in-in-in of concentrated spin? Concentrated…orange juice…that comes in the delightful cans. Jake's mother and father, do you have any orange juice cans? Canssss…" Ax hissed.

Jake's dad had no idea how to reply to this. "I'll…um…check the kitchen." He speedwalked to its safety.

"Can-can, can he do it…" Marco withered under my glare. "Sorry. Um…orbit. Spin. Hey, Sara, any dreidels around?"


	25. That Piñata Thing

"Upstairs," she half-smiled and climbed up, returning with three plasticy things.

"Wow…wow, this is going to save the world," Marco took a deep breath. "Anybody want to play?"

"I do!" Jordan exclaimed. "I always win. And it's not because people let me, either. You can't cheat at this game."

"Oh, can't I?"

She raised an eyebrow. "How many coins d'you want to start with?"

"All of them, of course."

"Ten or fifteen?"

"Fifteen."

"I get fifteen too…have you ever played this game before?"

"No."

She smirked, a smirk I was familiar with. Let's face it, a smirk that had shone from my own face. "Anybody else want to play?"

"I will." Tom slid off the couch.

I whirled to face him. "How long have you been down here?"

"Dunno. Hey, Jordan, have you ever hit a piñata?"

"Sure!" Her mind leaped into memory. "At a birthday party. That was so fun…"

"Sorry," I narrowed my eyes, "but how is that relevant?"

The question should have been obvious, but Tom was taken aback by it. "It…uh…well…just was curious."

"Why?"

"Because, what does it matter?"

"It just has nothing to do with anything."

"So what? I'm curious."

"So it's none of your business."

"Everything is Rachel's business," Jake commented from his sprawl on the floor.

"I'll keep that in mind." Tom picked up the pile of coins Jordan had dealt. "Okay cuz, give'er a spin."

"…thirteen…Hey! I only have fourteen coins!" Marco pretended to get mad at Jordan. "Are you cheating?"

She dubiously backed off. "Are you joking?"

"Yes, he is." Tom pointed to a clump of three coins between the middle of the players. "You have to put one of your chips in the pot to start. But then again, you don't know that."

"I do now," he replied.

"But you didn't before. Unlike Jordan, who knew not only how to play this but also what to do with piñatas."

I could not follow his logic. "What is it with you and this piñata thing?"

"Oh…come on. Even you aren't that dumb." Marco looked disappointed as he turned his head, peering up at Tom.

"Dumb?" Tom looked dumb_founded_.

"Yeah. Just because my name is Marco doesn't mean I'm a big piñata guy. Do you see me in a sombrero? No. No, you don't. And you've got your luvverly traditions and I've got mine and I-and I-" He ran out of deep stuff to say at that point and collapsed on his rear end.

Jake's dad looked over at us, concerned. "Maybe you guys should take a break."

"A break? This _is_ our break. Christmas break, peace goodwill and all that happy stuff, and we're at each other's throats."

"Hmm, why would that be?" Tom put a hand to his chin. "Maybe because…we don't all celebrate Christmas?"

"_Winter_ break." Cassie's mom got up. "No problems with that, I hope?"

"No, except…It's Christmas break. Everyone knows that." Marco's dad seemed to belch rather than speak the words.

This astonished Ax. "Every one? Two? Three?"

Cassie shook her head. "Is it inherent in all males to need to compete with each other?"

"Yes, Cassie, it is," Jake shook his head.

Sara quietly tapped Marco on his shoulder. "Are you gonna save the world now?"

He looked down at the flimsy plastic dreidel. "Let's save our own little world first."

"How d'we do that?"

"We don't."

"Oh…what?"

"We can't."

"Oh. Okay then."

She picked up the dreidel and twirled it between her fingers.


	26. Implacable Logic

I wanted to get up, to do something productive, but of course there was nothing to do except watch, and there was nothing to watch except Sara's simple game of spinning the dreidel. I tried to focus on the clock as well, in case Ax lost it again.

But all of a sudden Cassie's mom was prodding me. "C'mon Rachel, time for, uh, dinner."

Blearily, I looked at the time. Still safe. I waved Ax to the bathroom and entered the dining room.

Had it only been two nights ago we were eating pizza? Surrounded by peace, love, and goodwill…okay, for the most part? Picking at the…stuff…on my plate, I chewed mechanically.

"This stinks," Jordan sulked.

"Oh yeah?" Marco held a bite up to his nose. "Smells all right to me…whoops, here I go!" His fork lay empty, and he opened his mouth. "Nope, not here!"

His dad closed his eyes, as if praying for patience, and did not reopen them for a few minutes. It was my mom who spoke: "That's revolting."

Jordan cut to the chase. "So, d'we get any party hats?"

Jake's dad raised his eyebrows; he'd forgotten that part of the deal. "You could roll some up out of newspapers."

"Cool!" Sara leapt up from the table. "Where are the newspapers?"

"Out…in…the…garage. Uh, never mind."

"We could make it from napkins instead." Jordan attempted to roll up hers.

"Why can't I go outside?" Sara asked innocently.

"Cause you'll freeze to death!" Jordan scowled humorously.

Sara looked up at Tom, determined. "You're right. We should go out. Let's save the world."

"Not now. Maybe later?" Marco suggested.

"But we need to do it now," she protested. "I can't even make a paper hat!"

"There's plenty of paper around," Jake's mom contributed.

"But it's too small."

"How do you know?" My mom was always ready to find a logical loophole.

"Because." Some logic is implacable. "Can we go?" Sara approached Tom. "Canwecanwe?"

Tom didn't even make eye contact. "Uh, why don't you finish your dinner first?" Now this was new. It seemed like he was actually trying to stay _in_ the house. Or way more advanced than us, which I'm guessing is the answer.

"Actually," Ax spoke through a mouthful of mush, "you suck-kuh it."

"You got _schooled_!" Marco made a gesture involving swooping his hand downward that I think was supposed to make him look like a gangster. Unfortunately, this caused him to knock his plate over.

Jake's dad sighed wearily and waved my aunt back into her seat. "No, I'll get it…please don't waste the food, Marco."

He tapped his silverware against his plate moodily. (Then again, most of the stuff that had been happening for the previous few hours had been done moodily, so that wasn't saying much.)

Tom strode up and walked into the kitchen, where he fiddled with the radio. "Hey, I think we're getting a broadcast." Just static. "But if someone can get to the station-"

"Tom, you're not going out." His mom's voice was flat.

"Oh, I'm not?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"It won't be safe."

"Safe? Going out two nights after it snows isn't safe but starving to death is?"

"We're doing fine."

"So Dad freaks out when Marco drops food?"

"Tom…"

He stared her down. "What?"

"I'd like you to be more respectful."

"I'll do that." Exaggerating his steps, he returned to the table and sat down.

To an empty plate. Assuming Tom had left for good, Ax had stolen his food.


	27. For What It's Worth

Tom turned to his dad helplessly. "Um…"

"Sorry, kiddo, that's it."

"No more food?"

"No! Just that we're done with _this_ particular-" Jake's dad nodded towards the table.

"Mush…"

Cassie's mom turned to Ax sympathetically. "Do you by chance know your country's GDP?"

He looked at her quizzically.

"Take that as a no," Cassie laughed.

I scarfed down my food quickly and self-consciously, aware of Tom watching me, all of us with our food still left. Dropping off my plate in the kitchen, I didn't even volunteer to do the dishes or anything. Just tried to get out of there. (No, not the house.)

Sara approached me. "Will you do my hair?"

I stiffened, thinking about the state mine must have been in. "Have you washed it since you got here?"

"No."

"Well, it'll be difficult. Let's wait until we get out."

"Okay." She toddled off for a few seconds before returning. "Rachel?"

"Yeah?"

"_Will_ we ever get out?"

"Of course!" I blurted.

"When?"

"Soon."

She looked up at me warily. "I want to go home."

"Me too." I ran my fingers through her broken hair.

"But at least you have all your friends here."

_Not all of them._ "I feel sorry for you. I want you to go home and be happy."

"Rachel, is Tom right?"

I twitched. "About what?"

"Can we leave now?"

"No, not yet."

Forlornly, she trooped off. Cassie intercepted her. "D'you want to play Parcheesi?"

She shook her head and walked over to Tom, where she stretched to whisper something to him. He sat down next to her and they conversed.

I clenched my fist. "The-"

"Rachel?" Marco placed a warning hand on my shoulder. "This isn't worth it."

"Oh, isn't it?"

I must have said it too loud because all of a sudden everyone was looking at me. "Oookay Rachel. Want to control the decimals or whatever?"

_No…not really…_

"The decimals? What decimals? Mul-zuh," Ax wanted to know.

"Whatever they're called. Those things that tell how loud something is."

"Deci_b_els," Cassie's dad contributed.

At least the attention was not on me. I tried to find somewhere quiet where I could relax, and half-listen to the ensuing conversation. The minutes on the digital clock switched from :59 to :00.

"Somewhere Christmas just started," Cassie's mom remarked.

"Oh, and you'd care?" challenged Marco's dad.

"I would, and I do."

"Why?"

"It's nice to think about the entire world being-"

"Christmas. Why would a-you don't celebrate it, do you?"

"I do. I'm a Christian."

He turned his head to stare. "You're serious."

"Indeed."

"What was with that rip on the Bible?"

"What rip?"

"Your Revelation thing."

"I was trying to explain that there are multiple views, and that the widely "commercialized" view of Revelation is-"

"Talk straight, or not at all."

She was coming up with a reply when Marco once again cautioned, "This isn't worth it."

"Marco? You okay?" Jake adopted an expression of mock concern. "Or did I actually see you trying to keep the peace? Twice?"

"Both." There was no humor on his face. Whether he was tired, mature, or just beyond my comprehension at that point I didn't try to guess. None of us had much to say after that. We were all feeling the strain: we'd rubbed each other raw. We dispersed sometime later, going up to bed.

It was not until sometime later that I was able to pinpoint that word as the turning point in my perception of Marco.


	28. Mezzologue: Tobias

Mezzologue: Tobias

The first night had been manageable.

I perched on the roof of Jake's house, not confident enough to navigate home. The snow was still falling at that point, although it was a sane amount in the sky and on the ground. The day after that, though, was boring. So boring. There were about three conversations I had, all of them short. One of them, to be fair, was pretty interesting. Ax had some sort of song, which I could hear. In another language.

That night I was wary. I deliberately slept in an uncomfortable position, forcing myself to wake up at odd hours. Stay alert. Stay focused.

More monotony ensued.

It would have been that night, then, the one between the twenty…_n_th. I'd lost track. That…I'd gone soft, and I had nobody but myself to blame.

A real hawk would have found a way. Some way. A real hawk would have beaten the cold. Me? I didn't like it. Didn't like it at all. In fact, I _disliked_ it so much that I didn't mind not being cold.

So I wasn't. I ignored it, ignored it all. It didn't even register that the fact that I could see the stars meant the clouds had dispersed. That the storm was ending. That maybe…

My mind, somehow, maintained the belief that I was an independent hawk. So that at the end I was almost too proud to call >Ax? Rachel?>

But a different voice responded.

>This way.>


	29. The Dawning of the Rest of Our Lives

I didn't know what happened-if I had a dream, or there was a noise, but it got me awake. Unsure of whether I was up for real, I looked at the clock.

And panicked.

Leaping over the other girls, I flung open Tom's door. Sidestepping Marco and Jake, I hissed, "Ax? You awake?"

No answer. Figured. I shook him until he jerked. "What?"

"The power's out. The alarm clock won't work." Fear radiated from his shadowed face. "How long have you been asleep?"

"If I recalibrate, tuttuttuh…eeeeeei."

"Get up." I refused to accept the worst. "Go into the bathroom. I'll get Cassie."

He vaulted out. I followed and returned to Jake's room, rudely jolting Cassie. "Merrychrizmus…Rachel?"

"Help Ax. The alarm clock didn't work."

She raced to the bathroom. I followed, a step behind. "Demorph."

"I can't."

"Yeah you can," she urged. "Try."

He shook his human head, or at least that's what it looked like. None of us could really see much.

>Yes, I shook my head.>

Oh. Good to know.

Cassie placed a hand on his shoulder, trying to encourage him. I stared him down. "Ax. Demorph."

He staggered forward, his center of gravity changing as he began to grow. Cassie exhaled.

When it was finally over, I exclaimed, "What was that?"

Ax and I couldn't see what Cassie was doing, but it only took her a few seconds to test. "Yep. I accidentally acquired Ax, and the trance made him impressionable enough to listen to you."

"Whatever, it worked."

"Ax, you probably shouldn't go back to sleep. Can you stay up and keep remorphing?"

>Yes.>

"Okay." _I_ was going back to bed.

When I woke up for real, it was to chaos. Apparently Marco had thought it humorous to let Homer out of his kennel. Even more apparently, nobody else found it humorous.

The light through the windows was enough to see things dimly, but we needed more. Jake's dad had evidently figured this out, but had given Ax the candle to light, a bad choice. "Rachel?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

"What are these objects?"

I squinted to see them. "Matches."

"And what are they used for? Four is the square of two. And negative two, too. Two is a pleasant sound."

"Yup, it is, Ax. We light the candle with them, see?" I struck a match.

He stared in astonishment. "This produces artificial light? How?"

"It's the chemicals."

"Chemicals? Zuh?" This cheered him up drastically. He reached for a match. "I enjoy Earth chemicals very much. Cha!" He opened his mouth and brought up the match.

"NO! No, no, don't do that." I swiped it away and frantically lit the candle. "Okay? Who wanted this again?"

"Me," Jake's dad called from downstairs. "Tom's going to get a lesson in how to fix a blown fuse."

"I don't wanna," he sulked. Disheveled in large pajamas, he trundled down the stairs.

Jake, a little more awake as he had been forced to deal with Homer, caught my eye. I nodded.

Deliberately casual, he tried to keep the subject off Tom. "So…how're things?"

"Pretty good. Our friend here has discovered pyromania."

"Oh."

All of us crowded around to watch the ensuing drama as an unwilling Tom poked around the fuses. His mom held the candle up so he could have a partial clue as to what he was doing. "Errgh…okay, reach across here…hey! I found a quarter!"

"See? Aren't you glad you did this?" his dad asked.

"No. Oh…almost…" The lights flickered on. "Got it."

He climbed down from the stool he had perched on. "So, can we eat breakfast now? Will the stove work?" Sara inquired.

"Yes," my mom said curtly, at the same time as Jake's mom was saying "probably not."

"Probably-what?" My mom turned to Jake's, head tilted and hand on knee. They stepped to the side, discussing something.

Practically, Jordan stepped to the next room. "Hey Sara, you couldn't eat breakfast even if the stove did work!"

"Oh why not?"

"Cause it's already lunchtime!"

"What?" Tom bolted after her. Fixing the fuse had reset the clocks, and they now displayed a time of 12:00. "It's noon?"

"No," Ax said, "it has been for-"

"Hey, not now, okay?" Jake interrupted.

Marco cupped a hand behind his ear. "Do you guys hear that?"

Cassie nodded, worriedly. "Footsteps. Someone's running-"

A crash, like a shatter. Tom was going to risk it.


	30. Triumph of the Skies

"What was that?" Sara's face had paled.

"I don't know," our mom said.

Jake's dad walked toward the stairs. He'd have no chance to stop Tom. We had to make a call, and we had to make it right then.

All of us, by instinct, turned to Jake first, then looked around at each other. Ax's mouth was hanging open; I don't think he really understood what was going on.

>Tom had just left the house.>

So he had. Um…yeah. Marco looked almost disappointed, like he'd come "so" close to something and lost it, which in a way he had. Cassie had closed her eyes, resigned. I can't even remember what I looked like. Jake's face, however, was hardened. He was ready. "Sorry, Dad, you can't…take care of this."

"Excuse me?"

"There's no time to explain." He took off, up the stairs. We probably bowled over his poor dad in the race to follow…too bad. Tom's window was broken, shot through and the shards pushed down onto the snow. It was just starting to melt. "Bird morphs," he said tersely.

"Are you-"

Jake cut Marco off. "Yes. We can't let this slip through, you know it."

"Yeah."

Jake's dad caught up to us. "What's going on-oh my…" He stared at the window.

"We don't have time to explain."

"Should I-" Ax wondered something but didn't get to finish.

"Jake, do you want me to try to explain while you guys go?" Cassie suggested.

"Uh…yeah. If you don't mind." I still don't know how she knew how to do that: knowing Jake would be able to concentrate that much better with her out of danger.

"Okay, showtime," Jake nodded curtly. Marco had already started. He squeezed through the window, followed by me; Ax, who had had to go through Andalite; and Jake bringing up the rear.

>There he is,> Marco let us know. >Heading towards the school?>

>I can't tell.> I flew up beside him. >Nope.>

>Is this unusually cold for you?> Ax queried.

>Unusual? As opposed to what?> Marco retorted.

>It's gonna be McDonald's,> Jake refocused us.

We were able to gain a lot of time on him, although the bedroom delay meant we weren't able to catch him. We demorphed at the door, and shivering, went inside. The restaurant hadn't yet reopened.

"Down?" Ax, who had morphed human, searched for direction.

"Uh-huh." Jake's teeth chattered as he opened the door to the refrigerator.

"Couldn't they have put the secret passage through the oven?" Marco tried to liven things up but none of us were paying attention.

We emerged into the Yeerk pool. It was more crowded than I had ever seen it: Controllers holed up by the storm were pushing each other out of the way in the quest to feed.

"We've lost him!" Marco slammed his palm against his leg in anger.

"What now, Pr-"

I swear Jake was hearing Ax before he even said it. "We shove through."

I was about to muscle my way in when Marco stopped me. "Not a good plan."

"Do you have a better one?" Jake's eyes shimmered in the dark cavern.

"One, don't turn into Rachel. One is enough."

"Really?" I tilted my head at him.

"Two, think. Would Tom's Yeerk be swimming with the low-ranks?"

"Are there smaller pools in this facility, P-"

Man is he fast. "I'm not sure. Should we look around?"

"Sure," Marco shrugged, his eyes (and mind) clearly elsewhere, roaming around the pool.

We kept to the border, testing most of the doors. They led to empty conference rooms, all except the last one we tried.

Well…if it had been empty, it wouldn't have been the last one.

It was locked, which got our attention. "May I do the honor?" I nodded towards the bolt.

"We don't need to attract attention," Jake looked around worriedly. "There are so many here."

"Okay," Marco rolled his eyes. "When I said not to become Rachel, I didn't mean to become _me_. Crack that sucker open."

"Ax, cover for her."

"Yes, my-"

"You know," Marco put his hand to his chin. "Sometimes I get the feeling that that really ticks him off."

"What? Who?"

"Just demorph before we get into Abbott and Costello."

I quickly morphed to grizzly and ravaged the door. Jake was able to see what was inside first, but didn't say anything. Marco peered in as well. "Uh…"

"Go to human, guys," Jake whispered, in awe of what he had seen.

We wouldn't be _that_ lucky. The Controllers were on us. "Uh, never mind," he amended sheepishly.

But without Cassie and Tobias, we were…I'm not even sure there's a word to describe it. Not exactly beaten, or I wouldn't be writing this, but not exactly victorious, as they…totally had the upper hand, and probably could have wiped us out. Do you have a word for it, Ax?

>I can _think _it, like this…but no word.>

Yeah, that's how it was. But…lack of word here.

So I was trying to take out a Taxxon when a Hork-Bajir stunned me with a Dracon. Unable to help the fight, I fell to the ground as some more Hork-Bajir started to drag me off.

>Stop!> Marco's voice, but I couldn't see him. Jake and Ax were engaged, but he just…wasn't around.

"Now see the honorable Andalites!" something laughed.

>You touch her, your boss gets it.>

"Boss?"

>I'm holding your Visser hostage.>

>Marco, what are you doing?> I privately pled.

>The Visser has to leave his host to feed, and there's one unconscious Andalite right here.>

>Wha…>

One of the Hork-Bajir tentatively turned back, trying to find out if Marco was telling the truth.

>Stay calm, Rachel,> Jake tried to comfort me. >We figure Alloran can't be out for long: whatever the Visser does to stop him from morphing wouldn't last a lot longer than he needs to feed for, otherwise it would be pointless.>

Calm. Right.

"Kinlatt arnost!" a Hork-Bajir declared. Reluctantly, the others released me, although it didn't do much good as I was still paralyzed. "Now you give back Visser."

>And if we don't?> Marco threatened.

"Your friend is still ours."

>Rachel, can you demorph? > he privately worried.

>Can I? I think. Should I? To human? Please tell me even you aren't that dumb.>

Ax had backed up to be by Alloran, who was just regaining consciousness. >War-Prince, can you help us?>

Blearily, he opened his stalk eyes. >_Aristh_?>

>Morph something that will overpower the Yeerks.>

>But I cannot. I am a…>

Jake took over and tried to get Alloran to snap into it. One of the Hork-Bajir reapproached me, wrist blade annoyingly close to my neck. All of a sudden I saw something that managed to be evil and terrifying while also brought hope. The Antarean Bogg-the morph that had eaten Elfangor-loomed in the small pool room Alloran had been inhabiting. >Would you Yeerk scum care to remain here? > Alloran taunted.

Apparently they did, as all of them froze.

>Leave your hosts now. I understand Kandrona starvation is less preferable.>

A mass of Hork-Bajir, human, and Taxxon, and even a few Gedd-Controllers rushed for the pool.

>That was almost _too_ easy,> Marco laughed in thought-speech.> How are you, Rachel? I don't think anyone will mind if you demorph now.>

>I do not think anyone will _see_ if you demorph now,> Ax added.

That I was able to do. I walked over to the tiny room, where Jake had demorphed and Ax was standing with Alloran. >Where's Marco?>

>Hold on a sec.> A Yeerk emerged from Alloran's ear, fell into the tiny pool, and demorphed. "He's still in a daze."

>Daze?> said a voice familiar and yet brand-new. An understatement. For the first time, Alloran surveyed us. >After everything I've been through…humans and an _aristh_. Four of you? No, five…an _estreen_…> Marco must have dumped a lot into his memory.

But not enough. "Six", I replied almost defiantly.

"Time to go home, I think," Jake exhaled.

Alloran and Ax started leaving. I followed, with Jake.

"Forgetting something?"

We turned around to see Marco, sludge dripping from his arm, holding Visser Three triumphantly in the air.

Sharing the Yeerk's weight between our talons, we flew home. Everyone was outside despite the cold, waiting impatiently. Cassie would later tell me that she was worried she'd have to physically stop them from trying to follow us (!).

We clamored in. Alloran put the Yeerk in the sink-we'd decide what to do with him later. "We won," Cassie gave way to her emotions. "It's over."

>Not yet.>

We switched our attention over to Ax. >Is there something you need to do, Aximili?> Alloran asked gently.

He nodded gravely.

"We'll come with you," Cassie eagerly leaned forward.

>No. > He shook his head, looking at me. >This is for us alone.>


	31. Ellimystical Dreams

The rest of the day happened, I'm sure, (after we came back in), but I was too drained to be conscious of it. Ax-never really thanked you for that.

>For what?>

Oh, you know. Explaining…

>I could see you were not equipped for it.>

Putting it lightly.

That night, however, I do remember. I'm not sure if I actually woke up in the middle of it or dreamed it, but it wasn't even relevant.

The Ellimist was there. Standing next to my bed, or dream-bed, or wherever I was. He nodded and might even have winked at me.

I'd forgotten about him, but memory came rushing back. "You can do it!" I blurted. "You can bring him back?"

"Who?" he smirked, knowing perfectly well.

If I hadn't been so tired I would have rolled my eyes. "Tobias."

"Oh." He tilted his head, as if in consideration. "_This_ Tobias?"

I saw him in some twist only the Ellimist could have come up with: fully human and smiling. Choking up, I was about to say something when I saw where he was.

It was the voluntary hosts' area of the Yeerk pool.

"That's not him!" I was indignant.

"It might have been." And all of a sudden we had left the Yeerk pool and were on the deck of a Yeerk ship-the Ellimist and I, not Tobias. And when I say we, I mean he was standing next to me, and we were looking at…ourselves. Sure, I was a little older, but it was definitely us.

"Uh, care to explain what game you're playing _now_?"

"Listen."

I heard a weak version of my own voice. "Um, am I, like, dying here?"

"Very much like."

The images came like a slide show: Marco shielding his father from a Dracon beam, Sara kicking and screaming as she was dragged off the infestation pier…so many horrors. And finally Jake, in tiger morph, leaping towards the pier. Cassie, in wolf morph, had been surrounded by a dozen Hork-Bajir and dragged to the pool.

"Jake," I rolled my eyes, even though "he" couldn't hear me, "you're great and all that, but you cannot take down twelve Hork-Bajir at once."

And then I saw he wasn't aiming for the Hork-Bajir…

"Stop it!" If the Ellimist wanted me to break, he'd get it. "Make it stop!"

"But of course."

The slideshow began again, but different pictures this time. Marco and his dad, standing with a woman I didn't recognize. Alloran grazing. A gym, empty except for a boy in a basketball uniform. A uniform that bore Jake's last name, the name he can finally say.

I blinked, and realized it was Tom. "Is this real?"

The Ellimist shrugged, that annoying cryptic shrug. On second thought, anything he does is annoying and cryptic. "Congratulations."

Back in my bed. No Ellimist. Surprisingly, I was able to fall back asleep, and like so many other people, dreamed of a trip flying.

And like so many others, my dream couldn't come true.


	32. In Hope

_Author's Note: This is the end. Short, but compared to the prologue...okay, it's still short. But that's how I wanted it.  
H__ope you enjoyed and thanks for reading!_

Well? Is that all?

>It will never be all.>

Oh, you think you're so deep.

>Deep? I am on the same surface as you.>

Ax, of course, is right. It will never be over, but I'd written down everything I needed to write. For the last few days I've been here in the scoop, going through it all over again.

I put down the notebook and begin to morph eagle. I'll be back soon. Catching a thermal, I drift until I spot the construction site below me. It hadn't been so long ago: from the sky, it was easier to be objective.

I land and demorph, walking around with no need to be anywhere.

In Israel, I wonder idly, the dreidels would have to have different letters. The meaning-the commemoration of the Romans' defeat or whatever it was-is obviously, the same, but a different abbreviation…

"A great miracle happened _here_."


End file.
